Two Ways of Using AshtakaVarga

I use AV in two ways. First method is ORGANIC, i.e., using all major tools of Vedic Astrology as a composite whole, interplaying with each other, which I am explaining below. it is time consuming, and I use AV only when the standard method does not give a clear-cut result (this is what BPHS says) and is doubtful due to various contradictory conclusions from various charts.

The second method is same as used by those who use AV as standalone tool, but I never use it for general chart reading. I use it for making a long term graph through my software, ranging from 24 days including all planets and lagna, to many years when lagna and fast moving planets are left out. Three such graphs are available at my website which were mentioned here in JR before the recent Indian elections :

These long term graphs help in finding out good and bad durations, and when we use other standard tools of Vedic Astrology for these desired durations the predictions become more reliable (This is the ORGANIC or COMPREHENSIVE method). This is what BPHS also states. Used in isolation as standalone tool, AV seldom works correctly.

In this method, there are two variants : DAC and SC. DAC (Dashaa Aarambha Chakra) is impractical now because it requires birthtime accuracy of a high degree. The only other alternative left to us is SC (Sudarshana Chakra) which should use VPC (Varsha Pravesha Chakra) of two types, normal (so-calledTajik without touching that book) type and SC type dashaas. Birthchart (SC and all divisionals) gives results for the whole life and not for a particular dahsaa period. For a particular dashaa period, we should make either DAC as BPHS clearly states twice, or SC with combination of SC-dashaa, VPC and Vimshottari (if the result is still uncertain, then AV is to be used). Now comes the answer to your query with example :

My Mercury MD is running in birthchart (SC). Overall results coming from Mercury should be judged from three charts constituting SC (LK, SK, CK, i.e. Lagna Kundali, Surya Kundali, Chandra Kundali). Vimshottari timings of Mercury's MD should be judged from this overall result of SC. My Mercury sits in 5H as 9L plus 12L in a friendly sign owned by yoga giver Saturn (owner of kendra and trikona). Hence, Mercury is a benefic. But it has zero aspect on 4H in LK (Lagna Kundali or main birthchart). But SK and CK are benefics for 4H, with some problems too.

During Mercury's MD I had to sell one of my houses at a very low price, and after two years I sold another house at a very high price. Both houses were sold during Venus AD. Here too, there was some maleficence on 4H from Venus but a slightly more beneficence. First house was sold in Venus PD and second house in Venus PD.

Hence, merely Vimshottari cannot explain these two events which were very important for me because it is my major source of livlihood since I do not ask for fees for my astro and other works.

VPC's annual and monthly charts explained these two events with some more clarity. I pay special weightage to Vimshottari planets in VPCs. But still some doubts remained.

AV removed the remaining doubts : at the time of selling my first house, Vimshottari Merc-MD was running and AV had gochara Mercury in 11H of income from natal Mercury having 8 benefic Rekhaas of AV, which is maximum possible beneficence AV can give. But AD planet Venus was in 12H which was 4L + 9L (yoga giver but in 12H), hence not much harmful.
AD planet Venus-AV had gochara Venus in 2H of wealth from natal Venus, but with only 3 rekhaas out of maximum possible 8 and 6L+9L, but 4H was ruled by yoga giver Jupiter which was 4L. Hence, I could not get full price but whatever I got saved me from a grave crisis due to communists planning to finish me (Venus was 6L in BAV) , and saved my college too.

Chart for the time (including relevant divisionals) when houses were sold were also important but only for fixing precise timings.

When I sold another house, gochara Mercury was in 2H from natal Merc but with only 4 rekhas, while 4H from natal Merc had svagrihi Venus with 5 rekhas, hence 4H was highly benefic in BAV of Merc.
And gochara Venus was in 6H from natal Venus but in own sign, and MD planet Merc was in 4H from gochara Venus.

Thus, remaining uncertainties of birthchart's Vimshottari and VPC were removed by AV.

In both cases of house selling, SC Dashaas were respectively of 2H of wealth and of 5H respectively, both benefics for wealth.

Thus, combining AV with all major tools of traditional Vedic Astrology, we get more definitive results. I have shown here only D1 analysis. Similar analysis should be made of other relevant divisionals, e.g., D-2 (12-house D-2 ; Sun and Moon of D2 are deities and not houses).

In my own case I use DAC (Dashaa Arambha Chakra) which took me nearly one month of hard work to make, because DAC needs birth time accuracy of less than 0.001 seconds and is possible only if original error is less than 1 or 2 minutes at most. If DAC can be made, there is no need of SC and AV. This is what BPHS states. But making DAC is now a Herculean task. Earlier, it was comparatively easier because sootikaa-griha data and garbhaadhaan details were maintained and Jyotishis as well as clients were more pious and therefore helped by the powers above.

How To Interpret More Rekhaas in Trika Houses

"Suppose 8th from Saturn is having more rekhas, will it be happy or unhappy for accidents? Or will more auspicious Rekhaas in 12H bring more misfortune by means of enhancing expenses ?"

This question is in the context of AV. In the AV-phalaadhyaaya of BPHS, four verses (38-41) answer his question. These verses say that 8H from Saturn indicates death and longevity This chapter clearly mentions in many verses that BAV is being talked of. It means the four verses about Shani talk of Shani-BAV. Hence, when verse-38 speaks of 8H from Shani's place, we have to view the 8th house from gochara Shani, because the verse says "Shanaishchara-aashrit-sthaana-ashtamam". In Shani's BAV, natal Shani always remains fixed in the first house, hence there will be no need of using such words had natal Shani been intended. The implication is that 8H from gochara Shani in Shani's BAV indicates death and longevity. here is one example : Saturn is raaja yoga giver in my chart, and on the best day in my life, it was Saturn's Vimshottari MD and in Shani-BAV gochara-Saturn was in 4H from natal Shani, and 8H from gochara Shani (i.e., 11H from natal Shani) had 8 rekhas which means 100% beneficence : on that day I got initiation into ancient secret order by dint of blessings of my spiritual Guru Ji, because long tapasyaa &c had brought fruits on that day (I do not want to disclose my personal affairs, these things are forbidden to be declared publicly). But on that day, 8H from natal Shani had only 2 rekhas. Hence, the verse implies 8H from gochara Shani and not 8H from natal Shani. Vimshottari also helped. When Vimshottari opposes AV result, AV results do not bear fruit. Therefore, we must combine the results of all charts. I had serious mrityu-yoga then which I was trying to avert through propitiation, but the results were better than I expected.

I have described above only the correlation of only Vimshottari's MD-planet Saturn with its BAV on that date, but all the five levels of Vimshottari planets had very high rekhaas in significant houses in their respective BAV charts on that date. Here is a summary : AD was of Sun, and in Sun's BAV 12H from gochara-Sun had 7 rekhas (moksha). PD was of Rahu and gochara-Rahu was in a sign having 7 rekhas and 12H from it also had 7 rekhas, 8H from it had 7 rekhaas. SD was of Venus and in its BAV, 9H of fortune had 7 rekhas. PrD was of Moon and in its BAV 3H from gochara Moon had 8 rekhas, 7H had 7 rekhas, etc. On that date, individual rekhas of planets had maximum rekhas for those planets whose Vimshottari was running.

Hence, more rekhas in 8H from Shani indicate averting death and accidents and increase in longevity. It is wrong to suppose that any single planet is related to accidents.

Exactly same thing is expressed in Santhanam's version in different wording :
अष्टानां सर्वभावोत्थम् यथोक्तम्-अशुभम् शुभम् ॥ ज्ञात्वाSSदौ करणं स्थानं बिंदुरखोपलक्षितम् ।
Santhanam translated it exactly as I have given above.

No version of BPHS says bindu is auspicious. there are some mediaeval texts which give inverted meanins : dot as auspicious and rekha as inauspicious.

The most extensive writings of Devarshi Narada are available in Narada Purana which explains all six Vedaangas, including all three skandhas (branches) of Jyotisha. Its Horaa part is perfectly in harmony with BPHS, though not as exhaustive as BPHS. There, rekhaa is auspicious and bindu is inauspicious, as in all ancient texts like BPHS and nadi granthas. The siddhaanta skandha of Narada Purana is 100% replica of Suryasiddhanta. This Puraana can be freely downloaded from Maharshi Institute of Management's website, but its commentary is out of print. Summarised Hindi commentary is available from Gitapress (Gorakhpur), in which Jyotisha portion has been translated exhaustively (i.e., not summarised).

In AV analysis, I have to add one thing :

While rekhas Ilines) and bindus (dots) are to be determines with reference to rasis in gochara as well as in birthchart, the bhaavachalita chart at the time of event, i.e., gochara, is of great importance. Here is one example :

At the time of my mother's death due to an accident when I was 14 years, my Vimshottari had Jupiter's MD.

Bhaavachalita chart of that time with lagna as first house had highly malefic Jupiter as 4L + 7L (kendraadhipati dosha) sitting in 6H.

Jupiter's BAV with natal Jupiter as lagna had gochara Jupiter in 3H which is malefic, and this 3H had only 3 rekhas which is inauspicious.

In BAV of Jupiter, 4H from Jupiter had 4 rekhās which is almost normal (1-4 rekhās are inauspicious, and 5-8 rekhās are auspicious in increasing order). But in 4H from Jupiter, debilitated (neecha) Ketu was sitting, while neecha Moon and neecha Rahu were sitting in opposite 10H from Jupiter and were aspecting 4H, and 4L Venus was also neecha. There were five neecha planets at that time.

D-1 and its Vimshottari, D-12 and its Vimshottari, VPC, AV, gochara bhāvachalita, etc all were highly malefic at the moment of my mother's death. When all major pointers are malefic (or all are benefic) for some particular house, event related to that house becomes a certainty. Problem arises for weak events for which various charts give conflicting results and we have to compare their strengths which is highly troublesome and requires much experience.

Gochara versus AshtakaVarga

In popular parlance, Gochara is the placement of current planets with respect to natal Moon. There is a wrong conception that Lunar Gochara is distinct from AshtakaVarga. Some novices are spreading the idea that Gochara is more important than and unrelated to AshtakaVarga, because Gochara is more used than AshtakaVarga by astrologers. Such persons have never tried to compare Gochara with respect to AshtakaVarga. Take the good/bad results of eight planets+lagna in eight BAV (Bhinna Ashtaka Varga) in BPHS (Brihat Parāshara Horā Shāstra) with respect to natal Moon in each BAV, and denote the bad results with "0" and good results with "1" as in the following table, followed with Lunar Gochara results in Hindi taken from the book "Bhartiya Jyotish Ka Vaigyanic Vivechan" (भारतीय ज्योतिष का वैज्ञानिक विवेचन, page 223) on which the degree of D.Litt (Vidyaa-vaachaspati विद्यावाचस्पति ) was awarded by KSD Sanskrit University in 1981. This table shows that the so-called Lunar Gochara is actually taken from Ashtaka-Varga. Out of the 12 houses for each of the seven planets which make up 84 cells in this table, only one cell shows mismatch between Lunar Gochar and AshtakaVarga : ninth house under Moon, which should be auspicious but the book shows a misprint "rog" (रोग) which has been highlighted in red. Lagna-BAV has no counterpart in Lunar Gochara, while Rahu-Ketu have no counterpart in Lunar Gochara but they have been shown in this table. Conclusion :

The Ashtaka Varga results for Natal Moon in seven BAV (Bhinna Ashtaka Varga) charts are exactly the same as Lunar Gochara.